FARAWAY – Review

And how brightly it glows
Every single evening,

I'm already on run number… honestly, I've lost count. All I know is that I've been trying for about an hour to beat my previous record, not because it unlocks anything new in the game, but out of pure stubbornness. I'll be honest with you: it's hard these days to find a game that keeps your eyes glued to the screen and has you saying "just one more go", even when it's late and you should be getting a few hours of sleep. Yet, to my surprise, FARAWAY pulled off exactly that.

You might be wondering what this game actually is. Some roguelike or roguelite, perhaps? Well, no. FARAWAY is an arcade game about a shooting star whose goal is to create as many constellations as possible before it burns out. I'd love to chat about the story, but the game doesn't have one. What I can tell you is what it is instead: an experiment, a passion project, a triumph, an obsession, something impressive and very refined. Those are just a few of the words I'd use to describe FARAWAY, a game I hadn't heard of until recently. And if I did hear about it back in 2010, when it was announced, it certainly slipped past me.

Yes, you read that right: the game was announced 16 years ago, and looking at it, you're probably wondering why it took so long to come out. Setting aside the complexities of getting a video game distributed, the whole thing was built by one person: Steph Thirion. Sixteen years in which he wrote the code, created the minimalist design and composed the music.

Looking at it, you're probably still wondering why it took so long. Sadly, I don't have the answer, but I suspect FARAWAY was something the developer worked on in his spare time. What I can confirm, without a doubt, is that the game's world is procedurally generated at the start of every run. As I said earlier, this is an arcade game, and the system that generates the entire galaxy gives it plenty of replayability, since no run will ever be the same as the last.

The main idea is simple: you play a star and have to create as many constellations as you can to boost your score. Sounds easy, right? Just go left and right and you're done! Not quite. FARAWAY has a remarkably simple control scheme: a single button. This is where the elegance of the system shows, because the star travels in orbit around other celestial bodies. Press a button (any button) and the shooting star enters the gravitational field of the nearest body and starts orbiting it. To change direction, you have to plan your launch point from the orbit. It can be a point where the star reaches maximum speed, marked in red, or one where its speed is reduced, shown in a pale shade of blue.

The higher your score climbs, the more complex the generated world becomes. Constellations can't be drawn just anywhere, only in special sections marked by a red field. Once you start drawing a constellation by orbiting a star, you have to steer the shooting star, and the line it leaves in its wake, so that it "catches" as many stars as possible! But be careful, because the line isn't allowed to pass through the same spot twice.

The "reward" for high scores is unlocking hand-made puzzles created by the developer. They come in two flavours: high-score challenges and challenges that ask you to form specific constellations by following a set route. Although they add to the game's replayability, I wouldn't call them the main attraction.

FARAWAY is a simple game, but not an easy one. The controls are hard to master, but once you've got used to them, you'll find it hard to put the game down. I confess there's little to say about the aesthetics, because the game looks lovely, and as for optimisation, I had no problems on Xbox Series X. Still, I'm not sure that PC or the more powerful consoles, such as Xbox Series X and PS5, are the ideal platforms for a game like this. I think it would be a better fit for the Nintendo Switch 2.

FARAWAY is a special game, but given its genre and its simplicity, it's hard to put a score on it. For that reason, it will be one of the few modern titles we recommend without the traditional score you're used to from us.

Thanks to Annapurna Interactive for the opportunity to play FARAWAY

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Available on: PlayStation 5, PC, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch
Played on: Xbox Series X
Release date: 5 November 2026
Developer: Steph Thirion
Publisher: Annapurna Interactive